Yinon Magal (file)
Yinon Magal (file)Moshe Shai/Flash90

Incoming MK Yinon Magal (Jewish Home) heavily criticized the Likud on Friday, saying that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu prefers to form a government with Labor-Hatnua, despite multiple promises both before and after elections.

"I think that there has been a spin here from the first day of [coalition] negotiations," Magal stated in an interview Friday morning to Army Radio. ''The Prime Minister did call [Jewish Home chairman] Naftali Bennett first [after the elections - ed.], but since negotiations have begun, [progress] has been slow. The Prime Minister met with Bennett twice and didn't offer him anything." 

Magal also rejected reports that the Education Ministry was offered to Jewish Home.

"[Netanyahu] didn't offer anything," he said. "There is a spin Israel Hayom is putting out that we were apparently offered the Education portfolio, and that there is internal competition over it. This is nonsense; there was nothing, they didn't offer us anything." 

Magal accused Netanyahu of making the coalition demands so high that Jewish Home will be forced to back down - paving the way for a unity government. 

"We want to make the Jewish Home a junior partner [to Netanyahu - ed.] in the government," he said. "But [if not], that's OK, we'll be in the Opposition and become a real right-wing alternative to the Prime Minister's policy." 

Sources indicated to Arutz Sheva on Thursday that negotiations between Jewish Home and Likud are stuck at an impasse, and that Jewish Home is "furious" that Netanyahu has not offered three key positions - Foreign Minister, Defense Minister, or Education Minister - to the party, despite the fact that Jewish Home garnered just 8 seats in the 20th Knesset elections.